Home Improvement History Lessons: Siding

While vinyl siding is the most popular type of siding in today’s homes, it wasn’t always that way. In fact, back when people built their own homes, they usually turned to whatever material was locally available in order to create siding. Here, our siding experts share a brief history of how today’s siding came to be:

The 18th & 19th Centuries

Back in the 1700s and 1800s, homeowners often turned to three types of materials for their siding: wood, brick, and stone.

While it wasn’t the best choice for the environment at the time, wood was easy to obtain and one of the best ways to shelter a home. Homeowners could easily make use of the trees on their or their neighbor’s property.

Another common material was brick. Because clay could be found in many parts of the country (and all you needed was fire to harden it), brick was easy to acquire and easy to work with. In addition, many homeowners could create the brick as the house was being built.

As farmers cleared their fields for their crops, many found an abundance of stone and realized that the material could be used as a protective part of their home. Like brick, they were able to stack stones together to form siding.

20th Century

Once service members returned from overseas in the mid-1900s, they needed a place to live, so the housing industry began booming and three more siding materials became popular: aluminum, vinyl, and fiber cement.

Aluminum siding was introduced in 1947 by Jerome J. Kaufman. After realizing how paint bonds to the aluminum fuselages of World War II planes, he created the first baked-on color siding that became a popular choice among homeowners.

Even though vinyl siding was produced in the 1930s, it didn’t become widely used until the 1970s. Because it offers the same protection as aluminum siding but with less chance for dings, dents, and rust, it became the most chosen siding material.

In the mid-1980s, an Australian company called James Hardie Inc. developed a product with a wood-like appearance and long-term durability. Otherwise known as fiber cement, many homeowners turned to it to protect their homes.

Today

Since the introduction of vinyl siding, it’s become the material that people turn to most often to protect their homes. At P.J. Fitzpatrick, we offer vinyl siding in a wide variety of colors to suit your personal taste. Our siding is not only beautiful, but also durable and designed to withstand wind, hail, rain, UV rays, and more. Contact our siding experts today and find out why so many homeowners turn to vinyl siding.